


I Still Feel You

by moonstruckhargrove



Series: The Billy Hargrove Chronicles [4]
Category: Stranger Things - Fandom
Genre: F/M, Funerals, Heavy Angst, Mentions of Suicide, this gets heavy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-05
Updated: 2018-12-05
Packaged: 2019-09-07 15:39:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16856734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonstruckhargrove/pseuds/moonstruckhargrove
Summary: Based off the request: "Can you do a billy hargrove imagine based on the plot of ghost basically & it’s just super sad & gorgeous anyway thank you!!!"





	I Still Feel You

The rain came down in droves, pattering against the window as Billy stood before it. The sky was a deep grey, the clouds rolling on for miles in the distance. It matched his mood: bleak and dreary, and he was overall just numb. A storm was brewing inside of him, something dark and heavy and angry, and it took him clenching his fists into his dress pants to keep from putting a hole through his bedroom wall. He’d hate to explain that one to his landlord.

A soft knock rapped on his door, but he didn’t acknowledge Max as she poked her fiery head inside.

“Billy? We need to leave soon.” Her tone was soft and sympathetic, and it made him angry. She didn’t wait for a reply, just shut the door and left him to brood in silence.

The air inside the car on the ride to the church was thick and stagnant. Billy sat in the backseat while Max perched in the passenger seat; Susan was driving, and her presence was enough to make him want to shove open his door and fall right out of the moving car. _Why the fuck was she here anyways?_

He knew it was unfair, targeting her the way it was, but as far as he was concerned, if it hadn’t been for her he’d never be in this position in the first place. It was all her fucking fault. _It wasn’t; it was his._

The neck of his dress shirt felt like it was choking him, tightening around his throat no matter how many times he adjusted it. The tightening feeling only increased as he followed Susan and Max into the church, and the sight of the flowers at the altar made him lose the breath in his lungs. _This was too real._

He sat stiffly in the pew, his hands balled into fists on his thighs. His eyes never strayed from the photo they’d chosen of you to display above your casket. It was one of his favorites; your smile was wide, eyes bright. It was a photo taken on one of your family vacations with the mountains standing tall in the background. It was a perfect representation of you; wild, free, and unable to be tamed, kind of like him.

Once the pews were filled with your family, your friends, and other acquaintances in your life, the pastor began his service. Billy tuned out as he droned on and on about the Lord and His welcoming of you into his embrace. He fought off a scoff; you were about as religious as he was. Your parents all but forced you to attend church on Sunday mornings, and in turn, you’d dragged him with you if only so he could be within their good graces. The first break in the service, the two of you would duck out for a quickie in one of the choir rooms, a sculpted Jesus on the cross overlooking you.

Billy smiled softly at the memory, feeling his eyes blur a bit the longer he stared at your smiling face. Then it abruptly dropped. _It’s your fault she’s gone._

He let out a shuddering breath, bowing his head to prevent anyone from seeing him lose his cool. Billy was nothing if not the picture of masculinity; he didn’t cry, he didn’t beg. But as your sister stood to give her eulogy, a beautiful piece of work in his opinion that nailed you down to a T, he felt his resolve slipping. He flinched when Max’s hand reached over to curl around his, loose enough that he could pull away if he wanted. But he didn’t; he welcomed the touch and he tightened his hand around his sister’s.

You had loved Max and he secretly loved that the two of you got on so well. You were so quick to put him in his place whenever he’d snap at the younger girl or yell or call her a rude name. It, in turn, taught Max how to stand up for herself, and quickly enough, you had rubbed off on her. Even Billy wasn’t safe from a verbal lashing from the feisty redheaded.

The rest of the service was agony for Billy. The atmosphere was still thick, and the sniffles that echoed as eulogies were read made everything real for him.

But nothing compared to the pain in his chest when, at the cemetery, they began to lower your casket into the ground, floral arrangements and all. It felt as if a vice had been wrapped around his heart and was squeezing. Blood rushed in his ears and he found himself stumbling to his knees to the chorus of a few choked sobs. Billy himself may not have been very well liked, but no one could deny the absolute love he felt for you, and watching him break down at your grave site brought tears to every eye present. He curled into the grass, full-on ugly crying into the turf, disregarding his now soiled dress pants and jacket. 

The service had been concluded for thirty minutes before Billy finally pulled himself into a sitting position. Max and Susan stood at a distance, their faces wet with tears as they stood under an umbrella, as they watched Billy fall apart for the first time ever. He sat by the open grave site for another fifteen minutes before he wiped his nose on his jacket sleeve and staggered to his feet.

 _God he needed a drink_.

He did just that after Susan dropped him off at home. Despite his previous surliness towards his stepmom, he just nodded sagely when she told him she’d be there if he needed anything. Inside his apartment, his breathing hitched. Everywhere he looked reminded him of you; the throw pillows on the couch over which the two of you had argued for twenty minutes in the store. Billy had been unable to comprehend the need for such silly things in the first place.

“ _Because_  Billy,” you’d whined, “they’re pretty and _decorative_!”

He’d rolled his eyes hard enough that he almost saw the back of his head, but smiled at the wide-eyed insistent look on your face. Like with most things, he gave in to you, and he ended up with four throw pillows on his yard-sale couch.

With another strangled cry he picked up one of the pillows and hurled it across the room, raking his hands through his short hair. At your insistence, and a cruel joke that the mullet was rapidly going out of style, he cut it, leaving it short on the sides and longer on top. Even his haircut had _you_  written all over it.

With a muttered _fuck it_ , Billy turned right around and left the apartment. He walked to the closest bar, a whopping two blocks away, which had come in handy when the two of you would go out and get blissfully drunk and then stumble home to fall into a messy session of wild, drunk sex. It was easier without a designated driver.

His boots scuffed the pavement as he walked, head low and hands tucked in his pockets. The bar was pretty empty when he walked in, his hair dripping from the rain. He sat down on a stool and Jim, the bartender, shot him a nod of condolences. The two of you had been some of his favorite customers, always livening up the place. Jim set down a double of whiskey in front of Billy, frowning when the grieving boy tossed it back without so much as a wince and asked for another.

By 8 PM, Billy was mind-numbingly drunk, but it did fuck all to quell the ache in his chest. In fact, it made it even worse. He cried on the seemingly long and lonely walk back to his apartment. He couldn’t believe he had to say goodbye to you not once, but twice now. First in the hospital and then at the cemetery. It was all too much, and the whiskey he downed did nothing to banish you from his head.

He unlocked the door to his place, fully intended on passing out face-down on his bed. Maybe he should hold his breath so he couldn’t smell the fragrance of your shampoo and your skin on his sheets.

He nearly leaped out of his skin at the sight of you sitting on his couch.

“No. _No no no no no no_ ,” he groaned, pressing his hands into his eyes. When he pulled them away, you were still there, smiling radiantly at him. Emotion rose up within him, coiling around his lungs and squeezing like a python.

“Y/N,” he sobbed, staggering drunkenly forward to embrace you. He gasped aloud when his arms went right through you. “What? How?”

“Hello, my love.” Your voice was like music to his ears and it brought on a new onslaught of tears. “Drunk again?”

“It was your funeral today,” he muttered, wanting so badly to reach out and touch you. Momentarily he was confused at why he wasn’t freaking out just a bit more over the fact that the literal ghost of you was in his apartment, but he chalked it up to a hallucination brought on by too much booze.

Your ghost just smiled sadly.

“I’m so sorry, baby.” Saying the words he’d been feeling all week came out on an agonizing exhale. He wiped at his eyes as he dropped onto the couch beside you, and you cocked your head.

“What for, my love?”

God what he wouldn’t give to hold you.

“It’s my fault,” he cried into his hands as he held his head in them. He was crying freely now, his cheeks red and nose runny. Seeing you, even if it was a trick of his mind, filled him with the worst pain and yet the biggest relief he’d ever felt.

“Were you driving the semi?” you asked, your head still tilted. Billy dragged a hand down his face, sniffling.

“No, but…”

“Then it isn’t your fault, honey. It was an accident.”

“But I was speeding. I thought I could beat the light…”

“I always did tell you you drove like you had a death wise,” you mused, and the sight of your smile lifted the corners of his mouth. His eyes raked over your form, dressed in the outfit you were wearing that night but without all the rips and the blood.

“God, I miss you. It’s only been a week. How can I do this without you?” he muttered pathetically. His hand itched to reach out and pull you to him, but he knew better. Your ghost shifted closer to him, that sad smile still on your face.

“You have to. But you know I’m always with you right? Just like your mom?”

He snorted a bit. “Really? You’re feeding me that “I’m in your heart” bullshit?”

“You know it.” You grinned and it lit up your whole face. “Besides, it’s true as all get out. You know…you know I’ve met her? Your mom?”

He felt like he couldn’t breathe as he looked at you.

“Yeah, she, uh, she’s something else. Now I know where you get your temper from.” You chuckled. “But I also know where you get your good heart.”

Fresh tears welled in Billy’s eyes the more you spoke.

“She’s proud of you, you know. She wanted me to tell you.”

The dams broke behind his eyes and poured down his face. He ducked his head at the wave of emotion welling in his chest. Hearing that his mom, of all people, was proud of him, put him over the edge.

“I need you,” he sobbed, “both of you. Let me come with you. I can…I have pills…”

Your expression changed into something hard and determined. “No, Billy. It isn’t your time yet.”

“But it’s too hard. It…everything…hurts.”

“I know, my love, but like that saying goes, this too shall pass.”

“I wish I could hold you. I just want to feel you again.”

“I know, Billy. I wish you could too. I miss you so much. I heard you in the hospital, you know? Before it happened. I heard everything, and I wish we could have had that future together. 

“I won’t have it with anyone else,” he said, looking at you. “You were it for me.”

You smirked, a loving adoration in your eyes at his admission. “Likewise, baby.”

“Do you,” he paused to huff a laugh, “do you remember senior year when we nearly set Harrington’s hair on fire?”

You giggled, and the sound was music to his ears. What he’d do to hear that again for real.

“Of course. You waited until he was bent over the Bunsen burner to light it, and the chemicals caught fire.

Billy laughed, a loud belly-laugh that bubbled in his gut. It felt foreign to him, to laugh like that, since the last time he had had been when you were alive.

The night was spent reminiscing with your ghost, crying with you over the things you’d never have together. When the sun began to rise, you looked forlornly out the big bay window overlooking the alley below. You sighed almost inaudibly.

“I need to go,” you told him apologetically. Fear passed over his face.

“No, please don’t.”

“I can’t control it, Billy.”

“Will I see you again?” he asked, already knowing the answer. Your frown confirmed his fear.

“I’m afraid not. But I will be with you, and I want you to know how much I love you, and how proud I am of the man you’ve become. You’re more than that angry boy I met in Hawkins. You’re good, you’re kind, you’re sweet, and you will get past this.”

“What if I don’t want to?” he mumbled so brokenly that it tugged at your heartstrings — if you had any.

“You must. It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live,” you responded, trying not to smile at your cheesiness. But Billy did, and it lifted your spirits.

“You’re such a nerd.”

“But you love me.”

His face turned serious. “I do. So much, Y/N. I wish I could show you all the ways I love you. I should have. Should have told you more often.”

“I know you do. You showed it more than you needed to say it. You showed it in everything you did every single day. And I’m going to hold onto all of that.”

“So will I.” Before his eyes, your body began to fade as the sun crested higher. “No, please.”

“I love you, Billy. I’ll see you in a while. Take care of Max okay? She’s going to need her brother.”

He nodded, his throat tightening as you continued to fade into thin air. You looked around you at the apartment you used to share, from the throw pillows you’d argued about to the picture frames documenting your entire relationship from beautiful start to its premature finish. Then your eyes met his and you smiled that beautiful smile at him, and then you were gone.

* * *

Billy Hargrove died in a car accident a year later when he swerved off the highway, through a guardrail and plummeted into a ditch. The police ruled the death an accident due to excessive speed.

The truth was, Billy wasn’t strong or patient enough to go through the rest of his life without you. When he saw you again, you gave him a verbal lashing that had him groveling to you for eons. But God, was he elated to hear your voice ripping him a new one once again.


End file.
